Die mexikansiche Hacienda am Beispiel des Beckens von Oaxaca, Mexiko.

Ein Beitrag zur Begriffsbestimmung

Abstract

The scientific term Mexican Hacienda is often discussed. Some authors on Latin America tried to find out one adequate term for economic entities very different in space and time. In the Valley of Oaxaca the term Hacienda is restricted to economic entities of mixed production devoted to supplying local and regional markets with both grain and animal products in colonial times. Many Valley estates denoted as haciendas by the colonial records had no minimum size comparable with the rural estates of central or northern Mexico, nor did they attain economic or administrative independence. Most of the estates were small, owners were not aristocratic and the casas grandes or cascos were of very modest proportions. All Oaxaca Valley haciendas secured permanent labour by debt peonage and combined ranching and agriculture. These features divided them from other Spanish estates like ranchos, labores or estancias. The concentration of land in the hand of some few families, which started after population decline in the 17th century, never reached a degree like that in other parts of Mexico. Therefore the traditional Indian agriculture could survive in some parts of the valley until today. Nevertheless the often unused lands of the former large-scale rural estates, once called haciendas, cause the problems of the illegal squatter-settlements near the city of Oaxaca today.